Just walk, don’t drive, to exercise every day

Sydney-based consultant dietitian
Naras Lapsys
has looked at obesity, eating and exercise patterns from all angles. Growing up in Adelaide, he put himself through university as a personal trainer “before they became fashionable" and taught kick-boxing while on the way to completing two degrees and a PhD in medicine. He studied obesity from a molecular genetics approach for 10 years at the Garvan Institute, then decided to take a more people-focused approach, doing a master’s degree in nutrition and setting up a consultancy, The Body Doctor, in Sydney’s Bondi Junction.

There are many causes of obesity in Australia, he says. Among them are dramatic changes in the food chain, the higher availability of cheap and processed food, particularly processed food with “massive amounts of carbohydrates", the US-style upscaling of food volumes, the comparatively high rates of depression in Australia (which can lead to comfort eating), the intense working hours and the fact that people are far more sedentary today than they were even 15 years ago, let alone 40 or 50. But Lapsys also says that poor town planning and commuting patterns play a big part. “In the newer suburbs," he says, “they try to pack in as many houses as possible. They forgo footpaths; there is little incentive to walk everywhere. Everyone has to commute by car."

Spend one day in Tokyo, he says, and you will immediately notice the difference between it and Sydney. “People don’t drive their cars. It’s a massive city, yet in Tokyo – Paris is another example – they move their people well. You see people walking everywhere – there is no choice. They walk to work or to the station; at night they walk out for dinner because housing is so small. People live out in the city, life happens out in the city – we don’t have that here."

Lapsys says it is easier for most people to chip away unwanted kilograms by changing eating habits than through exercise alone because you have to significantly increase your exercise levels to do so. But at the least, he says, “we should all have the intention to do some level of activity every single day".